STEVE DAMISH: On Dad's Day, maybe save this 'applause'

On Father’s Day, my mind swings to sex – actually, to my first lesson in sex education, which in the pre-Internet days was provided by none other than dear old Dad.

He taught me everything he knew when I was 10. I remember it seemed a short lesson from a guy who had been in the Marines and had six kids (which I realized that day you can do without knowing much about sex).

He pulled a sneak attack on me and my two older brothers, when he turned a fishing trip to Maine into a sex seminar. Dad had no choice but to trick us, because the previous times he tried this we either:

A. Pretended to throw up

B. Yelled: “Mom, Dad’s talking about sex again!”

C. Ran into the woods

D. All of the above.

So Dad waited. And he plotted. Then, during our August vacation, he suggested an afternoon of fishing for the mighty landlocked salmon. Little did we know it would, instead, be a meek explanation of how the Damish kids came to be.

Yuck.

Into the boat we went, motoring out to depths so deep none of the pre-adolescent boys would dare dive for freedom. Far from land, nothing in view, we heard unthinkable things.

We heard why God put certain parts on a man, and other parts on a woman, and why it’s okay to do certain things with those certain parts when you’re married but not okay to do them if you’re not married and especially if you’re by yourself.

As if torturing his captives, he talked s-l-o-w-l-y, and did his best to illustrate his message – with his hands. I’ll leave most of that to your imagination, or you can Google Deranged Dads.

But something you might not find there is how he described sexual diseases. One of these dreaded diseases they heard about in the military went by the initials “VD,” he told us, which my oldest brother and I had always thought meant “Victory in Denmark” – or something like that.

But in the military, he said, they called it “The Clap.”

Noticing our confusion, he felt compelled to demonstrate. So Dad clapped his hands once, then twice, then a third time, pausing between each to impart his wisdom:

“You see what I mean” – CLAP! – “It’s called The Clap” – CLAP! – “Just like this is called a clap” – CLAP! – “But this clap is much different than that clap” – CLAP! – “This clap can’t kill you” – CLAP!

End clapping. None of us clapped back.

I had no idea what Dad was talking about, and tried to remember what Mom had said about stroke symptoms the week earlier. But my two older brothers – they understood, and rebelled.

At 15 and 16, they began cursing and swearing (apparently they had missed my father’s lesson on using proper language). Then, they threatened to jump – but my father was, at this juncture, still bigger than both.

And Dad continued, through more awkward symbolism – and it got worse. I fished throughout the talk, but remember hearing words and phrases such as sperm (no idea what whales had to do with clapping), intercourse (no idea what highways had to do with whales), and abstinence (no idea what not going to church had to do with anything).

I caught no fish – no doubt Dad’s clapping had scared them more than my brothers.

We puttered in an hour later – spent, sunburned, vowing to never do this sex thing, or get in a boat alone with him again. I believe we all fulfilled the latter.

Steve Damish is the managing editor of The Enterprise. He can be reached at sdamish@enterprisenews.com.

My father, the Marine, considered his mission accomplished – and appeared triumphant. I considered the day wasted – but here I am, decades later, remembering it on Father’s Day.

So something stuck. Right? I’m not sure, because I don’t remember having this talk with my kids. Perhaps it’s time I get them in a boat, cut the engine mid-lake and explain the mysteries of life and sex – before the Internet or their friends do it for them.

But I’m not sure. Please, clap if you agree. Don’t worry, you won’t get a sexual disease doing that.